THE GOSPEL
I wanted to include a segment that clearly defines the Gospel message. With so much information at our fingertips, it’s easy sometimes to overlook the most essential.
The Gospel is NOT a subjective response to what “man must do.” The Gospel is God-centered, not man centered, focusing on what God has done, and is doing, through His Son Jesus Christ to provide everything necessary for the spiritual restoration of humanity to God’s original created intent.
God is holy and just (Psalm 89:14). The wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23). Sin is the transgression of the law (1 John 3:4). See the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20). We have all missed the mark, transgressed God’s laws. God is rich in mercy to all that call upon Him. (Ephesians 2:4).
We have all broken God’s law a multitude of times, but God came to this Earth in the person of Jesus Christ and paid for our sins.
John 3:16 — For God so loved the world (you and I) that He gave His only begotten Son (Jesus Christ), that whoever commits to trust in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
Jesus satisfied eternal justice, then rose from the dead, so that God can grant us eternal life. Jesus rising from the dead isn’t just a historical fact, it’s witnessed by those who ask Him to be the Lord of their lives. He takes up residence in anyone who is willing to trust Him as Lord. Once this exchange happens, the same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead historically over 2,000 years ago brings that same life-giving miraculous power to any who commit to trust in Christ. This is a GIFT from God. But just as we cannot earn a gift, so we cannot earn eternal life by our good works. Ephesians 2:8-9. For by grace, you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God not of works, lest anyone should boast.
John 5:24 — He who hears My word and commits to trust in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life.
Life’s greatest mystery, death, that will be an experience of every human being, was destroyed. The power of death was destroyed by the One who said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6). Scripture tells us He who has the Son has life (1 John 5:11-13). When God reveals to a human being how much they’re truly loved, how much He cares for us, and values us, His loving kindness will draw us to repentance.
Walking through this life with God Himself within us. This intimate union is what draws us into friendship with our creator.
The power of God Himself can be experienced daily in our normal, everyday lives. What an incredible journey we are now on. Life as God intended.
The Gospel is “good news” for a reason. In the enormous complexity of God, it is His willingness to be personally involved with me that constantly fascinates me and continues to this day to draw me closer to Him.
The Gospel has always been and always will be the message of a restored relationship between humanity and the divine creator. Religion and oftentimes religious activity are not the answer. The answer is found where it’s been since the beginning of time—personally relating with the living Lord Jesus.
GOOD NEWS
MY JOURNEY TO BEING THE PRESIDENT OF MM
I was born March 22, 1966 in Hialeah, FL. My parents were married in March of 1955. My mom brought 2 girls into their marriage, Irlene and Nina. Together my parents had my other sister Sugie, and then me. Our family was the product of the American dream. Both of my parents were only educated through the 8th grade but worked extremely hard for everything they ever owned. My dad ended up running his own business and my mom usually helped in the office. They lost my oldest sister Irlene to leukemia when she was only 17. We were not a perfect family, and I know they struggled off and on with all of life’s challenges that eventually come to all of us. I would say I had a great childhood. As I entered my teens, I started hanging out with some kids in my neighborhood that weren’t necessarily the best influence, but I was also easily influenced! Although my parents never really drank alcohol and definitely wouldn’t touch drugs, I found myself partying at a young age. My life spiraled down to the bottom of the barrel when I was just 21 years old. My mom and sister, Sugie, had recently become “Christians.” I thought they were both crazy. I’m sure everyone in my family believed in God, but nobody had ever discussed being able to have a personal relationship with God. Something definitely had changed within my mom and my sister, but I wasn’t clear on what exactly that was. I’d developed my dad’s need for speed at a very young age. At age five, I was given my first mini-bike, and that set the hook. I’ve always enjoyed riding motorcycles. Eventually, I won a regional amateur motocross championship and in 2003, while on my way to a professional sportscar championship, competed in the Baja 500 through Mexico on a motorcycle. At age 12 is when I had my first taste of 4-wheel racing as my dad and I started racing go-karts together in 1979. He had briefly raced go karts in the 50’s and this was something that we both enjoyed together.
Motorcycles brought me to speed, competitiveness and fearlessness, but karts became my passion to strategize racing and winning. With four years of sprint and endurance karting in the junior classes behind me at 17 years old, I was in my first year against adults and won the WKA National Karting Championship in 1983. My thought had always been that if I won a karting championship, I’d be on my way to a professional racing career. That bubble was burst almost immediately. No doors really opened for me with the karting championship, and the disappointment seemed to only make me want to party more. From the time my mom became a Christian, she was consistently trying to convert me and bring this awareness of God in my life, but I just couldn’t seem to be able to believe. Looking back, maybe I just didn’t want to believe. I did enjoy doing what I wanted, when I wanted, with who I wanted and the whole Jesus thing just seemed to be an obstacle to me.
THE EXCHANGE!
My parents were going through some difficulties with their business, I was in a low place, and racing seemed like it was going to be over for me. My dad had recently met a friend who would buy pickup beds from him and when my dad found out he was into racing, they started talking racing! Milo Coleman was his friend, and he was building a race car to compete in a new oval track series that would bring out some of the best short track drivers in the country. A one-thousand-dollar entry fee and with a winner-take-all purse! The first race had almost 70 cars entered and $70,000 seemed like a million dollars to me at the time! My dad introduced Milo and me. I had my first real opportunity to race a car. My mom was always dropping these Bible verses or “God sayings” on me that typically didn’t seem to faze me much. However, just before my first-ever car race, I knew what she had to say was different. Instead of qualifying for this race, we were to draw a number from a top hat. Very simple, 70 cars entered, numbers 1–70 were in the hat, whichever number you drew was your starting position. When it was my turn to draw, my mom stopped me on my way to the hat (more like intensely stood in front of me like to completely block my path). I’ll never forget her words. She looked directly into my eyes. She preached to me many times before. This was different. Something powerful was about to happen. God Himself was about to reveal Himself to me. Other than this amazing opportunity, to race a car for the first time, my life was a mess. One bad decision after another. Personally, I was paying the consequences in many ways of a life that was not in union with God. My mom said “God is going to reveal Himself to you one last time.” Now even though it was my mom, I know that what she said was as if God Himself was speaking to me. I walked to that top hat, still kind of in shock, and drew my starting position. Before I put my hand in the hat, what my mom said to me became personal, and this time Jesus spoke directly to my spirit, “I AM going to reveal myself to you one last time.” I put my hand in the hat and looked at my starting position—#1. Then I heard Him again, as plain as day, “One last time.” Freaked out would be a complete understatement. A long story short, it ended up being a blessing that we didn’t win the race. With $70,000 in my pocket at that point in my life, I probably wouldn’t be writing here today. The Lord always has a plan, and He knows exactly what He’s doing. We blitzed the entire field until a $3 part took us out of contention, just a short distance from the checkered flag.
In October of this same year, 1987, a short time after the race, I finally gave my life to Christ. This miraculous exchange not only allowed me to surrender myself, but also allowed me to now be in a spiritual union with my creator. I instantly became a new creature in Christ. My life and world changed 180 degrees. Suddenly I was empowered. No longer was I on my own. No longer was I lost. Jesus became the love of my life, and my dearest friend. Difficulties, challenges, frustrations, failures, temptations were all still there, but I was never going to go through them alone ever again. It was truly an amazing turning point in my life, miraculous is the only word to describe it.
Shortly after this experience, I found myself waking up very early in the morning to pray. I started journaling during some of these mornings. There was a clear theme emerging. I believed God was going to help me be a professional racing driver. I believed I was going to run a racing ministry that would minister directly to the racing community. Keep in mind, this was 1987. I had only raced in one car race. I had no idea how or where this ministry would take place. All I knew was that I believed God was going to help me. Thousands of closed doors. Thousands of lessons later. Participating with Jesus one step at a time (sometimes including steps backwards), the vision I was seeing became a reality. It wasn’t overnight, but God was very faithful to me. In 1997, almost 10 years later, was my first full season in professional sportscar racing. 1998 brought (2) professional sportscar championships in the same year. 2000 another, 2001 the American LeMans Series Driver Championship, 2002 P2 Prototype Champion, 2003 first ever Daytona Prototype Champion and my last championship in 2014. Over 60 Professional sportscar victories later, including (3) Daytona24 hour wins, (1) Sebring12 hour win, (1) Watkins Glen 6 hour win and at least twice as many podiums, including 1 of 5 times at the famed LeMans 24 hours. Since that time, racing and being a racing coach have taken me to racetracks all over the world—Australia, France, UAE, Brazil, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Mexico, Canada, Italy, Spain, England and so many beautiful places. Racing wasn’t the finish line. Remember earlier I wrote it took 10 years for professional racing to become a reality in my life?
Well, the other half to my journaling way back in 1987 was to run a racing ministry that would minister directly to the racing community. Twenty-seven years later, God’s plan never changed. In 2014, Motorsports Ministries founder Richard Anderson passed away after his battle with esophageal cancer. Richard’s family asked if I would fill in while they prayed and decided what to do with the future of the ministry. Soon after, I was asked to be the President of Motorsports Ministries and run the ministry. Currently (2022) we have two full-time and three part-time chaplains. We minister in two of the top sportscar series in North America. We average ministering at close to 30 race weekends per year. Through professional sportscar racing, we minister to a worldwide community at racetracks all over the country, with a message that goes around the world.
My goal in sharing portions of my journey was intended to give a glimpse into the pathway that brought me to where I am today personally and with Motorsports Ministries. However, I also wanted to encourage all who may be reading this. God is way bigger than any dream we could ever have. I also know that not every dream comes to pass, not every dream has a happy ending. Racing, along with all the accomplishments. The ministry, with all of the opportunities to help people and maybe give back a little. Neither of these, as a matter of fact, no accomplishment, no good deed, nothing in my life gives me continual fulfillment like my ongoing personal relationship with Jesus Christ. However, from this relationship, everything else has its place.
The truth is what empowers me to continue to participate with Christ one step at a time. In today’s culture, there seem to be many versions of the truth. I believe the truth is a person. His name is Jesus! I can lose everything, but I’ll never lose Him, and He’ll never leave me alone. Scripture tells us that He sticks closer to us than a brother. He knows us intimately, even the number of hairs on our head. That’s fascinating because they keep getting less and less for me which means that He is consistently recounting! He’s always looking very closely at us. Always loving, always protecting, always encouraging, always watching over us, always pursuing us. What an incredible creator we have. There is nothing God can’t do. He doesn’t always answer our prayers in the way we want Him to, but He’s always listening. There’s nothing that He doesn’t allow; but when it’s darkest, it’s good to remember the Lord does everything out of His everlasting love for us, and He is always desiring to bring us closer relationally to Him. There will be some things life throws at us that we simply don’t have an answer to or that we’re not prepared for. In those times, I’ve discovered that there is always a purpose, even when we cannot make any logical sense of the circumstance.
I believe that the best investment you could possibly make in life is in a personal relationship with Almighty God. Come just exactly like you are and be willing to participate with Jesus, wherever that might take you and whatever that might look like.
I’m a firm believer that it’s important not to isolate specific scriptures to help assure they’re taught and understood within the intended context, but some seem universally true regardless of if they’re alone or within the text it was written. This is one of the best examples that I hope encourages you. Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”
Much of religion, including Christian religion, fails to emphasize the objective work of God in Christ, focusing instead on the subjective response of what “man must do” in response to the historical presentation of Jesus. Instead of being God-centered, the gospel becomes man-centered, focusing on what man does to become a Christian, rather than on what God has done and is doing through his Son Jesus Christ to provide everything necessary for the spiritual restoration of humanity to God’s original created intent. The gospel message is and always will be God-centered. Christianity is simply a restored relationship with our creator. A union formed with God, a miracle.
I am no theologian, but I know that anything good in me is Christ. I am convinced that I need God. Every moment, of every day, for all of eternity.
IT’S NOT ABOUT OUR BELIEFS
Christian faith has repeatedly been cast and projected in the form of believe-right religion. This must be challenged by asserting that Christianity is not, and never was intended to be, an epistemological belief system. Yes, the Christian religion has a long history of constructing creedal belief statements. The Latin word credo from which we get the English word “creed” means “I believe.” To this day, people often ask to see one’s “statement of beliefs,” a formal statement of ideology and doctrinal beliefs. But man-made beliefs, and the systems in which they are often formulated, are a “dime a dozen” and of little value.
Yes, we continue to observe Christians honing and fine-tuning their beliefs, developing complex charts about “false beliefs” vs. “true beliefs.” Like children playing in the sandpile of human beliefs, they argue incessantly about whose bucket contains the most brilliant rocks. Having defined their beliefs as precisely as possible and polished them to a brilliant sheen, they then determine that anyone who believes otherwise is a “heretic.” One group I am aware of claimed not to believe in creeds, declaring “we have no creed, but Christ” failing to understand that, in their assertion, they are stating their credo.
Christianity is not a belief system. Human beliefs are human constructs of thought and soon become idolatrous formulation carved in the concrete of inflexible minds. We must eschew the idolatry of believe-right religion. The world of mankind wants, and needs, the reality and vitality of life that supersedes their selfishness and humanistic perspectives. Christians must cease arguing about beliefs and learn to enjoy life, living by the LIFE of the One who said, “I AM the way, the Truth, and the LIFE” (John 14:6), “I came that you might have LIFE, and have it more abundantly” (John 10:10). Dogmatic beliefs must be set aside to simply appreciate the living Lord JESUS.
From and through that loving relationship, miraculous things happen. In us, and through us, we are continuously transformed as we participate with Jesus. We live in a loving restored relationship with our creator and that impacts not only us, but the world around us. That world includes a very diverse racing community!
I love Jesus because He first loved me. This first causes me to choose to participate with Him in all areas of my life more of the time. I’m not perfect, just willing. Jesus is LORD, and I’m learning daily to trust Him to lead the race of this incredible journey called life.
When the checkered flag is displayed at the end of my time here on Earth, I’m excited and looking forward to going home where I’ll ultimately meet my maker and the love of my life.
I hope you’ve been encouraged by this portion of my experience.
Enjoy the journey!
Terry Borcheller